Niven, a follower, played in the Ballarat Football League prior to joining Fitzroy. He captain-coached Fitzroy in 1930 and 1931 before crossing to Melbourne, which he captained in 1934 and 1935. His brother Ray, who played beside Colin in 1931, later reunited with him at Melbourne where they again appeared together in the same side.

1.
Melbourne Football Club
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The Melbourne Football Club, nicknamed the Demons, is an Australian rules football club, playing in the Australian Football League. It is named after and based in the city of Melbourne, Victoria, Melbourne is the worlds oldest professional club of any football code. The clubs origins can be traced to an 1858 letter in which Tom Wills, captain of the Victoria cricket team, Melbourne has won 12 VFL/AFL premierships, the latest in 1964. The club celebrated its 150th anniversary in 2008 by naming 150 Heroes as well as creating a logo which appeared on its official guernsey. The football club has been a section of the Melbourne Cricket Club since 2009. In the winter and spring of 1858, an organised football team known as Melbourne played in a series of scratch matches in the parklands outside the Melbourne Cricket Ground. Other figures associated with this embryonic Melbourne side include cricketers Jerry Bryant, William Hammersley, Thompson, and teacher Thomas H. Smith. During meetings held on 17 and 21 May 1859, Wills, Hammersley, Thompson and Smith met near the MCG at the Parade Hotel, owned by Bryant, the resulting ten codified rules are the laws from which Australian rules football evolved. The first mention of a match played under the new code was between Melbourne and South Yarra in July 1859, with Hammersley as Melbournes inaugural captain. In 1861, Melbourne participated in the Caledonian Societys Challenge Cup, the club pushed for its rules to be the accepted rules, however many of the early suburban matches were played under compromised rules decided between the captains of the competing clubs. By 1866 several other clubs had adopted an updated version of Melbournes rules, drafted at a meeting chaired by Wills cousin. Harrison was a key figure in the years of the club, he often served as captain and, in later years. Due to his reputation and administrative efforts, he was officially named Father of Australian Football in 1908. During the 1870s, Melbourne fielded teams in the Seven Twenties, after a visit to England by one of the clubs officials, the colours of red and green were officially adopted by the club. Shortly following, the club wearing a predominately red strip. The name Redlegs was coined after a Melbourne official returned from a trip to England with one set of red, Melbourne wore the red set while the blue set were, allegedly, given to the Carlton Football Club. This may be the source of Carltons nickname, The Blueboys, in 1877, the club became a foundation member of the Victorian Football Association. During the same year the took part in the first interstate football match involving a South Australian side, Victorian

2.
Australian rules football
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The main way to score points is by kicking the oval-shaped ball between the two tall goal posts. The team with the score by the end of the match wins unless a draw is declared. During general play, players may position themselves anywhere on the field, the primary methods are kicking, handballing and running with the ball. There are rules on how the ball can be handled, for example, throwing the ball is not allowed and players must not get caught holding the ball. A distinctive feature of the game is the mark, where players anywhere on the field who catch a ball from a kick are awarded possession, possession of the ball is in dispute at all times except when a free kick or mark is paid. Players can tackle using their hands or use their body to obstruct opponents. The game features frequent physical contests, spectacular marking, fast movement of players and the ball and high scoring. The sports origins can be traced to matches played in Melbourne, Victoria in 1858. Its annual Grand Final is the highest attended club championship event in the world, the sport is also played at amateur level in many countries and in several variations. The games rules are governed by the AFL Commission with the advice of the AFLs Laws of the Game Committee, there is evidence of football being played sporadically in the Australian colonies in the first half of the 19th century. The earliest such match, held in St Kilda on 15 June, was between Melbourne Grammar and St Kilda Grammar. Born in Australia, Wills played a nascent form of rugby football whilst a pupil at Rugby School in England and his letter is regarded by many historians as giving impetus for the development of a new code of football today known as Australian football. Two weeks later, Wills friend, cricketer Jerry Bryant, posted an advertisement for a match at the Richmond Paddock adjoining the Melbourne Cricket Ground. This was the first of several kickabouts held that year involving members of the Melbourne Cricket Club, including Wills, Bryant, W. J. Hammersley, trees were used as goalposts and play typically lasted an entire afternoon. Without an agreed code of laws, some players were guided by rules they had learned in the British Isles. Another significant milestone in 1858 was a match played under experimental rules between Melbourne Grammar and Scotch College, held at the Richmond Paddock. This 40-a-side contest, umpired by Wills and Scotch College teacher John Macadam, began on 7 August and it is commemorated with a statue outside the MCG, and the two schools have competed annually ever since in the Cordner-Eggleston Cup, the worlds oldest continuous football competition. Since the early 20th century, it has suggested that Australian football was derived from the Irish sport of Gaelic football

3.
Australian Football League
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The Australian Football League is the pre-eminent professional competition in the sport of Australian rules football. Through the AFL Commission, the AFL also serves as the governing body. The league was founded as the Victorian Football League as a breakaway from the previous Victorian Football Association, the league currently consists of 18 teams spread over five of Australias six states. Matches have been played in all states and territories of Australia. The AFL season currently consists of a competition, followed by a 23-round regular season. The top eight teams play off in a four-round finals series, culminating in the AFL Grand Final. The winning team in the Grand Final is termed the premiers, the current premiers are the Western Bulldogs. The six clubs invited two more VFA clubs – Carlton and St Kilda – to join the league for its season in 1897. In 1908, the league expanded to ten teams, with Richmond crossing from the VFA, Port Adelaide was the most successful club of the competition winning three titles during the period along with an earlier victory. In 1925, the VFL expanded from nine teams to twelve, with Footscray, Hawthorn, North Melbourne and Hawthorn remained very weak in the VFL for a very long period. Between the years of 1927 and 1930, Collingwood became the first, in 1952, the VFL hosted National Day, when all six matches were played outside of Melbourne. Matches were played at the Sydney Cricket Ground, Brisbane Exhibition Ground, North Hobart Oval, Albury Sports Ground and Victorian country towns Yallourn, Footscray became the first of the 1925 expansion teams to win the premiership in 1954. Melbourne became a powerhouse during the 1950s and early 1960s under coach Norm Smith, the club contested seven consecutive grand finals from 1954 to 1960, winning five premierships, including three in a row from 1955 to 1957. Television coverage began in 1957, with telecasts of the final quarter permitted. At first, several channels competed through broadcasting different games, however, when the VFL found that television was reducing crowds, it decided that no coverage was to be allowed for 1960. In 1961, replays were introduced although direct telecasts were rarely permitted in Melbourne, in 1959, the VFL planned the first purpose built mega-stadium, VFL Park, to give it some independence from the Melbourne Cricket Club, which managed the Melbourne Cricket Ground. VFL Park was planned to hold 155,000 spectators, which would have made it one of the largest stadiums in the world – although it would ultimately be built with a capacity of 78,000. Land for the stadium was purchased at Mulgrave, then farmland, the VFL Premiership Trophy was first awarded in addition to a pennant flag in 1959, essentially the same trophy design has been in use since

4.
Fitzroy Football Club
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The club experienced some early success in the league and was the first club to win a VFL Grand Final. It also achieved a total of eight VFL premierships between 1898 and 1944, and more recently two VAFA promotions in 2009 and 2012. Despite this, the club survived in its own right and The Fitzroy Football Club Ltd came out of administration after the merger of its AFL playing operations in late 1998. For a brief time it experimented in partnerships with other semi professional, Fitzroy largely resumed its original VFL-AFL identity through its continued use of their 1975–1996 VFL-AFL jumper, their theme song and their 1884–1966 home ground at the Brunswick Street Oval. Fitzroy began in the D1 section of the VAFA in 2009 and it is notable for being the only club to have played in the VFA, VFL, AFL and VAFA competitions of Australian Rules football. In 2015 Fitzroy fielded its first womens team under the name of Fitzroy-ACU in partnership with the Australian Catholic University, in 2016, Fitzroy-ACU fielded two womens teams in the Victorian Womens Football League VWFL. From 2017, all Fitzroy teams play in the VAFA with the playing in the VAFAs Inaugural womens competition. The Fitzroy Football Club was formed at a meeting at the Brunswick Hotel on 26 September 1883, Fitzroys season-by-season records throughout its thirteen seasons at VFA level are given below. In 1897, Fitzroy were one of the eight clubs who broke away from the VFA to form the Victorian Football League, Fitzroy was the most successful club in the first 10 years of the VFL, winning four premierships and finishing runners-up on three occasions. In contrast, the 1916 Fitzroy team only won 2 home and away matches, all four teams qualified for the finals, and Fitzroy won their next three games to win one of the strangest VFL premierships. The Maroons won their premiership in 1922, a year season which included four very rough games against eventual runners-up Collingwood. However, after this their fortunes waned, and they did not make the finals at all from 1925 to 1942 and it was during this time that the Maroons became known as the Gorillas. Football was less affected by World War II than it had been in 1916 and it was in this year, under captain-coach Fred Hughson, that the Gorillas won their eighth VFL flag against Richmond in front of a capacity crowd at Junction Oval. However, it was also to be their last senior premiership, as the club, by the mid 1960s, Fitzroys traditional home ground the Brunswick Street Oval was in a state of disrepair. Pressure was applied by most VFL clubs, including Fitzroy, to have the ground improved, however, the ground managers were the Fitzroy Cricket Club. The Football Club had to pay the Cricket Club to use the ground, the football club put forward various ideas to try and change the situation, including the amalgamation of the Football and Cricket Clubs to form one club as in the manner of the Carlton Social Club. The Cricket Club held the licence and managed the ground. With a stake in the ground, the club could have better agitated for improvements to the ground by sourcing funds from other organisations such as the VFL

5.
Ballarat Football League
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The Ballarat Football League is an Australian rules football competition that operates in the Ballarat region of Victoria, Australia. The league features 11 senior clubs, North Ballarat City Football Club joined the league in 2008 season raising the number of teams to 11. North Ballarat City previously played in the Bendigo Football League for the two seasons prior to joining. The BFL is also a league for grass roots football with 10 junior clubs consisting of 63 teams from U/10 through to U/16.5. The Ballarat Football League season normally commences in early April with the season matches finishing in August. Upon Daylesfords withdrawal from the competition at the end of the 2005 season competing clubs played the opposition twice in the regular season, once at home. This reverted upon North Citys admission to the competition in 2008, the finals series is conducted in September with the Grand Final to decide the premiers for season held at the Eastern Oval. The match regularly attracts crowds in excess of 5000 people, the Chief Executive Officer of the BFL is Rod Ward. Ward is a former BFL player with the Darley Football Club, prior to his appointment to CEOs role in 2002, Ward worked for the Victorian Country Football League, the organisation that oversees the sport in country Victoria. The headquarters of the league, Saxon House, is located at the City Oval in Ballarat

6.
Jack Cooper (Australian rules footballer)
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John Thomas Jack Cooper was an Australian rules footballer who played for Fitzroy in the Victorian Football League. He died in action, whilst serving in the First AIF, Jack Cooper was the son of Fred and Florence Cooper. He was born in Fitzroy North on 21 February 1889, in his youth he was a fine cricketer as well as a highly talented footballer, and went on to be a regular player with the Fitzroy Footballers Cricket Club. He worked for the company of Fitzroy Football Clubs President, D. J and he and his wife, Margaret Malcolm Cooper, née Fletcher, resided at 38 York Street, Fitzroy North, and had one daughter, Margaret Isabel Maggie Cooper, who became a teacher. A somewhat thick-set man at 5 ft 10 in and 12 st 4 lb, recruited from the local team North Fitzroy Juniors, he played his first senior VFL game for the Fitzroy Football Club against Collingwood on 27 April 1907 at Victoria Park. In his first season, he played 11 matches and scored 1 goal and he makes up for his lack of inches with tenacity and pluck. He sticks to his man all day with a stubbornness commendable to fighter or footballer. He has great dash – the quality of being able to get to the ball in the lead, handling a football when running is a fine art. The finished player nowadays does not grab the ball with both hands when he reaches it and he scoops it up, as it were, with one hand, as he continues his run. Anybody can pick up a football when he has plenty of time to seize it, Cooper is an expert at handling the ball but, above all, he is a battler. He played in the Fitzroy team that won the 1913 premiership by defeating St Kilda 7.14 to 5.13 in the 1913 Grand Final Match, he was one of Fitzroys best players in that match. He was the Fitzroy clubs best and fairest player in both the 1911 and 1914 seasons, and he was the Fitzroy team captain in 1912, in his career with Fitzroy he played 136 senior games and scored 8 goals. He played his last senior VFL game for Fitzroy on Saturday 11 September 1915, in the 1915 Preliminary Final, that was won by Carlton 6.18 to 5.8. He was reported once in his career, in the 14 August 1909 match against Carlton at the Brunswick Street Oval, for charging and striking. Leaving his employment as a storeman, he enlisted in the 8th Battalion of the First AIF on 8 November 1915, in France, Cooper saw action in the Battle of the Somme. He was only in the trenches for a time when he was so badly gassed that once his immediate discomfort had been dealt with. Having recuperated fully, he played for the Australian Training Units team in the famous October 1916 Exhibition match that was held in London, just before returning to active service in France. Most likely through the effects of the gas, Coopers throat continued to him a lot of trouble and, once again

7.
Jack Moriarty
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Jack Moriarty was an Australian rules footballer in the Victorian Football League. Despite standing only 510, and weighing approximately 60 kg, he had the ability to jump over opponents and take strong over-head marks, in each of his first three matches with Fitzroy, Moriarty kicked seven goals en route to a then VFL season record of 82. Moriarty represented the VFL at the Hobart carnival in 1924 and went on to become a permanent fixture in Victorian sides for most of the next decade. At the end of his career, Moriarty had booted 672 goals in his 170-game VFL career, in 2004 Moriarty was inducted into the Australian Football Hall of Fame. Player honors, Fitzroy best and fairest 1927

8.
Frank Curcio
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Francis Frank Eduardo Curcio was an Australian rules footballer who played his entire 249 game career for the Fitzroy Lions in the Victorian Football League. He captained the club for four seasons, from 1938 until 1941, recruited from the Christian Young Mens Society in 1931, Curcio was a tough, hard ruckman, who also played well in the back line. He was renowned for protecting his smaller team mates, a bass violinist, Curcio combined his musical talents with his football prowess, but stood out of the game in 1937 to concentrate on his music. Ever conscious of safegarding his hands to work the strings of the violin, he once told North Melbournes Fred Fairweather, Hit me as hard as you like. World War II military service cost Curcio a place in Fitzroys 1944 premiership team, on 27 April 1946, Curcio became the first Fitzroy player to play 200 league games. Curcio retired in 1948, after 15 seasons and having played 249 VFL games, all with Fitzroy, curcios club games record stood for 23 years at Fitzroy until surpassed by Kevin Murray. He also held the record for most VFL/AFL matches played in the number 18 guernsey with 249 until Essendons Matthew Lloyd surpassed that figure in 2008, with the club now defunct, he sits in fourth position in the record books for most games played for Fitzroy. After Fitzroy and Brisbane combined their respective histories in 2001, the club unveiled a new 200 game honour board at the Gabba which included Fitzroy, Brisbane, the board was hung in the players rooms with a replica for the members area. The board itself was christened the Curcio-McIvor board, in honour of past players Frank Curcio, Curcio was the first VFL player of Italian background to really emerge as a great footballer. In 2007, Curcio was named in the VFL/AFL Italian Team of the Century, also in 2007, the Lions recognised Curcio as one of the best 10 players from the era 1927 to 1956. He represented Victoria on 3 occasions, Curcio died on 11 November 1988,14 days short of his 76th birthday. On 3 May 2001, Curcio was named in Fitzroys Team of the Century, Australian rules footballers with 200 games for one club Fitzroy FC honour roll List of Fitzroy Football Club coaches

9.
Haydn Bunton Sr.
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Bunton is the only footballer to have won the Brownlow Medal and the Sandover Medal three times each. He is one of four footballers to have won the Brownlow three times, and one of only five footballers to have won the Sandover at least three times. Bunton is also the player to have averaged one Brownlow vote per game over his career. Like cricketer Don Bradman and the racehorse Phar Lap, Bunton was a champion who made life bearable for the Australian public during the dark days of the Great Depression. A brilliant runner and ball-winner, he was regarded by some historians, the son of Victorians Ernest Edward Bunton, a brickmaker, and Matilda Caroline, née Luhrs, Bunton was born and raised in Albury, New South Wales. He originally played for Albury Football Club in the Ovens & Murray Football Association and his natural Australian football ability attracted the attention of all twelve VFL clubs. Fitzroy won the race to secure his services, but only after it was revealed that they had paid him £222 to join and he was subsequently unable to play during the 1930 VFL season. His initial, legal match payments were the modest sum of £2 per week, Bunton played district cricket for Fitzroy during the 1930–31 season, and scored 104 against Prahran. He resisted offers from clubs in the Victorian Football Association to play for them during the 1930 season, Bunton played as a rover/follower and achieved instant success, winning Brownlow Medals in his first two seasons in the VFL. He worked in a department store during the day, and practised baulking by weaving his way through crowds of shoppers, one of his opponents, Dick Reynolds, spied on him during this activity in order to learn how to defeat his technique. During his career at Fitzroy, Bunton won five club best-and-fairest awards and he was appointed captain of Fitzroy in 1932. He was runner-up for the Brownlow Medal in 1934, then won the award for a time in 1935. While playing, Bunton also spent the 1936 VFL season as coach at Fitzroy. He was also Fitzroys leading goalkicker in 1936 and 1937, in 1938, Bunton moved to Western Australia, taking the position of captain-coach of Subiaco. He won the Sandover Medal three times, in 1938,1939 and 1941, just as at Fitzroy, Bunton did not win a grand final during his senior career. Altogether, Bunton had won six league best and fairest awards in eleven seasons between the two states in which he had played. Bunton returned to Fitzroy for a few games in 1942, after being discharged from army service at the end of World War II he played 17 games during the 1945 SANFL for Port Adelaide. During that season Port Adelaide would lose two games during the minor round but would falter in the 1945 SANFL Grand Final to West Torrens

10.
Norm Smith
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Norman Walter Norm Smith was an Australian rules football player and coach in the Victorian Football League. After 200 games as a player with Melbourne and Fitzroy, Smith began a coaching career. Recognised as the father of modern Australian football coaching, Smith coached Melbourne to six premierships, Smith and elder brother Len were the sons of ironworker Victor Smith and Ethel May. After attending Westgarth Central School, Smith completed an engineering apprenticeship, in 1943, he took over his fathers engineering business in Northcote, later relocating it to North Coburg in 1954. On 19 October 1940, he married Marjorie Victoria Ellis, at the Wesley Church in Melbourne and their only child, Peter, was born in 1947. A brilliant all-round sportsman in his youth, Smith played first-grade district cricket and his first club football was for Dennis, which played in the sub-district competition, where his brother Len had started his career. When scouts for VFL club Melbourne arrived at the Smith household to sign Len, Melbourne were ambitiously rebuilding their side and Smith made his debut under legendary coach Frank Checker Hughes in 1935. Ironically, while Norms career blossomed at Melbourne, brother Len failed to nail down a place and he moved to the VFA. Smith became a regular in the first team in 1937, usually playing as full-forward, Smith quickly developed an understanding with teammate Ron Baggott and earned a reputation as a cool-headed, thinking player. He favoured the pass to a man in a position, the quick handball, the tap on. One scribe commented that he could make a line work around him. The Melbourne team was rising fast, they played finals in 1936 and 1937, the team took a step back in 1938, finishing fifth, but looked the team most likely throughout 1939. Under Hughes, a successful former Richmond player and coach, Melbourne had remade themselves into a professional outfit. Smith was one of many talented players who adhered to Hughes doctrine, now renamed the Red Demons, Melbourne went into the 1939 finals with a team based on all-out attack, with Smith the linchpin. In the Grand Final against Collingwood, Melbourne booted a record Grand Final score and set a new record winning margin, another flag was won in 1940 when Smith was the star, scoring seven goals in the Grand Final. The following year, the team marked themselves as a combination by completing the hattrick, despite missing players due to war service. Smith enjoyed his most productive season and finished the year as the VFLs leading goalkicker and he continued playing during the war years in a decimated Melbourne team. In 1944 Smith won The Herald newspapers best player award, Smith was appointed captain of the club in 1945, leading the Demons to their first Grand Final defeat in 1946

The Australian Football League (AFL) is the pre-eminent professional competition in the sport of Australian rules …

In 1924, Footscray, the premiers of the VFA, defeated Essendon, the VFL premiers, in the Championship of Victoria. The result played a large part in Footscray, Hawthorn and North Melbourne gaining entry into the VFL the following year.